Who speaks the most, out of
Cècile, Raymond & Anne?
Who speaks the most is a relatively simple way to determine who is more prominent in the production. Whose voice do we hear the most? Who gives their opinion, who asks questions, who tells it as it is?
The novel is mostly written in prose, is all first person narration, and so even when the dialogue is written, it's coming from Cècile, who tells us what has been said. It's retrospective, possibly up to a year old, the memories of this dialogue are of a time before a major trauma in her life. She is trying to understand the actions and emotions that led up to the death of Anne, attempting to make sense of whether the death was accidental or a suicide, and within that, trying to understand how much she was to blame for the death. There are many reasons to question the reliability of her as a narrator.
In adapting the novel, the writer and director create scenes and dialogue to translate prose into a cinematographic, or theatrical language. It is likely to be the case that extra dialogue will be written for most characters.
As demonstrated by the chart above, all adaptations have added more dialogue to the character of Raymond, than exists in the novel. Notably, however, Anne's character has had dialogue taken away from her in both filmic adaptations, which are written and directed by men. The female team behind the play have added considerably more lines to Anne. Of all the dialogue that Sagan wrote, 34% of it was given to Anne, with only 21% to Raymond. Both versions of the film have reversed these percentages; Preminger reducing Annes dialogue to 23%, and increasing Raymond's to 31%, TV Film reducing Anne's to 26% and increasing Raymond's to 33%. The play retains the weighting, increasing both with Anne at 41% and Raymond at 28%. If we hear more words from an actor, we hear their perspective more, we see circumstances from their point of view, we look at them, listen to them. In both films, we are being directed more towards Raymond than to Anne. In both the novel and the play, the reverse is true. In simplistic terms, where men have written and directed adaptations the percentage of the male voice has increased, and where women have told the story, the amount of time and space given to the male voice is reduced.
What are the words that have been added? What words have been taken away? I discuss these two questions in other areas of the analysis. However, one of the key findings, is that in the novel, Cécile only ever asks one question of Anne about herself; 'Am I intelligent?' This has been removed from the Preminger film, and replaced with only one question, which she asks of her father 'Am I pretty?'. In the TV film, both are included. What Preminger has done, is to remove her intellectual desire for approval from Anne, and replace it with an externally facing shallow approval from her father. Am I pretty is very VERY different from Am I intelligent.
Casting cannot be ignored here. Big stars demand larger roles, and in the case of David Niven and Jean Seberg, have more professional experience and can hold the film.
In three versions, Cécile has the most dialogue. In both TV versions, her dialogue increases, from only 21% in the novel, to 40% and 33%. In Preminger's film, nearly half of the dialogue is given to her. In the play, interestingly, she has only 6%, equal to Raymond, and here, Anne has the majority of the words.
There is a different reading, however, when Cécile's inner voice is also included within the calculations. The novel is entirely first person, so the book is all her inner thoughts EXCEPT the dialogue. The play has cast another actress to play another version of Cécile to speak the inner thoughts aloud. Both of the films use voiceover. By including the words Cécile speaks which are to no-one but the audience, AS WELL as her dialogue, the weighting between the adaptations is again, markedly different.
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The more interesting analysis comes by looking further into the decisions made by the adaptors into which of Cècile's inner thoughts have been adapted.
I discuss this in section 3, "Which of Cécile's inner thoughts are spoken aloud?"
This comparison is interesting to see whether Cécile's thoughts are removed and other people tell their perspective instead.
This comparison of the inner thoughts is covered over two pages, accessible by black arrows at the top of the page.
As the pie charts demonstrate, when everything that each of the three main characters says, is added together, the percentage of Cécile's voice drops to exactly 52% for both films, as Raymond's voice increases, but stays relatively similar, in the play.
Considerations here are that, in the novel, Cécile's voice is omnipotent, so even when she tells us other people have spoken, it's coming from her perspective, and the time she spends describing the other characters in the novel can be translated into action in the film. Plays are much more suited to monologues than films.
I discuss the differences between what Cécile knows and what she doesn't (when other people speak, and she is not in the scene) in a different section within this analysis.
